The light was red against the backdrop of the ominous October sky; snow willowed from the clouds in strains of small white freckles blanketing the streets of Detroit with an innocent glistening glow. The engine of the '65 Pontiac Tempest LeMans sitting at Woodward and Elizabeth purred and moaned in anticipation of the coming green light. The Tempest and its driver missed the days of drag racing; two cars held back by an imaginary forcefield controlled by a set of red, yellow, and green lights, and then the thrill of flying to the end of a quarter mile track trying to be the first across the line.
When the shimmering roads reflected the green light above, an orgasm of fuel gushed into the carburetor of the GTO 389 engine. The tires chirped and the flat black Tempest sped past the Fox Theatre and toward St. John's Cathedral.
In his peripheral vision he could see an oncoming specter traveling down Montcalm Street perpendicular from his path. The man's black boot punched the floor to drain as much speed as he could from the chassis. He heard what sounded like a backfire. 'No, two, three backfires' he thought. At the sound of the fourth backfire, the rear windshield splintered into millions of pieces, but still hanging on by a string.
"Shit. Not a backfire." Apparently, the game was in drive.
He grabbed the gearshift and dropped the hammer on the four-in-the-floor tranny speeding past the City Theatre and flying the car into an immediate left turn onto Fisher then another onto Park Avenue, the ghost who came outta nowhere still nipping at his heels.
The red and black Dodge Challenger barrelled through its gears trying to stay close to the Tempest that just cut a left hand turn and went off road through the Grand Circus Park towards the Edison Memorial Fountain. He cut around the fountain and crossed over Woodward bisecting the half-moon shaped park. He exited the park onto Witherell and immediately followed the abandoned elevated train track onto Broadway.
The Challenger followed as close as she could to the wylie prey she was following, she refused to lose this one. The ghost took Park Avenue around the park instead of going through it making up time, but only to lose the advance on the sharp turn onto Broadway. The Challenger made the turn and then settled in behind the Tempest, gun out the window propped on the driver's side mirror. A red lipstick smile formed on the driver's face, maybe she didn't need to get too close after all. The lipstick, fire engine red, matched the Dodge. The gloves of the Tempest's captain, equally reminiscent of the paint job, tightened around the steering wheel and skull-fashioned gear stick.
Watching in the rear view mirror, the Tempest's captain timed a hairpin turn through an empty lot just in front of a column holding up a lone section of track to the once operable "People Mover" system. The Tempest crashed through a rusted chain link fence and cut to the right down John R Street just as the muzzle flashed on the 9mm beretta. The bullet grazed off the spoiler and slammed into the brick facade of the YMCA building. The mysterious figure in the Dodge quickly put away the 9mm in its door holster and sped into the curb fishtailing into a trashcan and narrowly missing a homeless man that was a good impersonation of Rip Van winkle.
"Its three AM, the leaches are out late tonight." His mumbles were to himself but aimed at the empty back seat. "I hate hunting season." This comment was more to himself.
The expertly calculated turn of the Tempest and the slow fishtailing of the Dodge allowed the man to make some space between the two cars. He was able to make two more expert turns, one to the left on Farmer, one to the right on Grand River. The last one was unseen by the stalker. He took a chance and jutted left down an alley just before Griswold Street. Half way down the alley he threw the Tempest in reverse and backed her into a small alcove between two overflowing dumpsters at "The Albert" and killed the lights and engine. His fingers rested on the keys in the ignition, his hand wrapped around an inert 50 calibre bullet fashioned into a keychain. The smell of the decade old rotting trash turned his stomach.
"You're the best driver we have, he said. You're the only one who can make the jump, he said. You're the only one we trust with the cargo, he said." The driver mocked his employer.
He heard a thump coming from behind him and turned his head to the back wondering if his cargo was still in one piece. Thunder erupted in front of him and brought his attention back to the alley as a red and black two-toned 2012 SRT8 growled by right in front of the hidden Tempest. The Challenger's driver didn't notice until it was too late that she was driving right past her prey.
As she passed, the driver of the Tempest noticed the other driver's curly blonde hair just resting on her shoulders, her pouty nose atop her full lips, and he could see the explicit determination in her naughty hazel-grey eyes as she turned her head back towards his, catching a glimpse of his headlights. "Yeah, I'd do her once," He said louder than he meant to. 'Like Hell if leave my number, though,' he finished the thought in his head.
As he revved the engine and swooped in behind her heading back out the way he came, she mouthed the words, 'oh fu--.' She threw the car in reverse and the wheels fought back with a screech and a holler. The tempest scraped the wall trying to sneak in behind the surprised Challenger, but managed to accelerate out of the alley flying over the last bump and out into the street like a boy jumping out of the way of his mama's backslap.
"Do you always drive this bad?" The voice, coming from a fifteen year old boy climbing out of a hidden compartment in the back seat, was chipper for someone that's been tossed around the Detroit streets for the good part of the night.
"There's more demons out than usual tonight." He muttered to the dash.
"Well I think it's neat."
'Is this really the cure for the human race sitting in my back seat?' The thought was silent, but the boy had a good idea what he was thinking.
"How did you get out o--"
"--of the restraints? Yeah I'm not too happy about that, but I understand."
The Challenger had a tougher time making its way out of the alley. She tried to hit the bumps too fast to catch up with the tempest and caught the side of the wall in a volley of sparks and profanities. She snagged the edge of a gas pipe with her back bumper breaking it free from its home as she slid along the wall trying to escape the alley, a clear gas anxiously escaped the pipe into the snowy night.
The Tempest had turned right out of the alley and peeled down Grand River towards the elevated tracks. He whipped the car into a 180 just before the tracks, a loud thump was heard in the back from the boy being squeezed against the side window from the centripetal force. The occupants in the Tempest waited for a sign of a follower.
"Well, did we lose her?"
The man dispelled a disapproving grunt.
"If you're going to be out here, at least climb in the front seat so you can buckle up."
The boy vaulted into the bucket seat and strapped into the five-point harness with relative ease for someone who had never so much as stepped foot outside of the quarantine zone, much less in a car before.
The man looked on with stoic amazement as the boy, with a grin the size of "The Spirit of Detroit," turned to him wide-eyed with excitement. "I'm Glitch."
The man wanted to ask why the boy was so important, but he never wanted to know what was in the package and he sure as Hell didn't want to start now.
"I like your jacket. Is that a military patch from the Great War? What can I call you? Can I wear your beanie? I'm cold."
A sigh came from the man's lips as a sign that he didn't like his calm disturbed. "Fenyx, they call me Fenyx."
"You are the FENYX?! The one who k---"
A fireball lit up the sky near the alley they had just escaped.
"Sit back and shut up. I gotta get you to Boston in one piece, but that doesn't mean I can't muzzle ya. NO DISTRACTION little squirrel. Got it?"
"Got it."790Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7aK7lvciPo
The sparks created by the Charger's rear quarter panel on the brick wall ignited the colorless gas emanating from the broken gas main as the car sped out of the alley in reverse. The car came to a stop just out of the alley as she looked on in stark amazement. "Shit. What the He---" She looked left out of her window and saw her mark sitting on the street taunting her. She eased the Challenger forward and to the left to face her opponent. Both engines took turns revving, marking their territories. Fenyx rolled down the window to smell the night as he growled the engine. He looked on to his nemesis in wonder. She answered with her own higher pitched growl.790Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb0ifdXpEvB
'She's pretty good,' he thought letting his arm stretch outside the car.
The boy looked on and could not contain his excitement. "Ohhh this is going to be so much fun!" He squealed.
He curled the fingers of his outstretched hand into a fist and pointed his middle finger skyward signaling he's ready for the fight. She brandished the gun and took a pop shot across his bow flying wide right into the darkness.
"OK. Let's see who's got a bigger cock." Fenyx revved the Tempest's throttle one last time and released the brake, a cloud of smoke from the burning tires frozen in the air as the car lifted and flew up Grand River toward the Challenger. 790Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDxSTVSP41L
"Wait, you have a rooster in here?" The boy looked over to the driver, genuinely confused. "Can I pet it?" The man momentarily cut disapproving eyes to the boy.
Scarlet hover over the Challenger's gas pedal and pressed it to the floor. Her acceleration was faster than the Tempest's, but the antique muscle car owned the top speed. As the cars barrelled down toward one another, each driver wondered which one would turn first. Neither had ever been the chicken before, neither planned to start now.
400 feet. The sounds of engines gunning for each other mixed with the ongoing explosions raping the otherwise silence of the quiet Detroit night.
300 feet. Each engine tapped into every last ounce of energy for more and more speed.
200 feet. Knuckles were white, lips were bit. His eyes were squint with determination. Her panties were wet with excitement.790Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1AhO9NIC5p
100 feet. The speeds of the two cars were starting to feel the aquaplaning event happening between the tires and the glistening road.
50 feet. The boy closed one eye.
40 feet. He closed the other.
30 feet. He opened both wider than he had ever opened them before. He recognized stubbornness when he saw it. That was the one thing he easily saw in most "regular" humans that he had came across.
25 feet. He felt butterflies in his stomach, an anxious energy surged through his limbs from his gut to his fingers and toes and back again.
10 feet. The man was stone cold. The woman was convinced of his weakness. The boy opened his mouth and out came, not a scream or a cry, but a death howl unlike anything that had ever been heard on Earth. A pulse of blue energy escaped from the boy and returned in a flash. The electrical system of the Challenger shut down immediately. A second pulse flew from the boy's outstretched hands and enveloped the Tempest as he let out his deathly moan.
0 feet. The disabled Challenger impacted the blue force field around the Tempest and lifted airborne landing on its side a skidding to a stop directly under a rectangular clock hanging from the corner of a brick and stone office building.
10 seconds after impact. The boy's howl subsided, and he settled into unconsciousness. The man was stunned, but he kept driving. In shock and disbelief, but thankful for the miracle. The girl shook the glass from her hair and checked her limbs for breaks. 'The airbags didn't even deploy. Was this the special weapon they were all told about?'
He was pissed at himself for putting his pride before his cargo. He didn't believe before, but he sure as shit believed now. 'This kid might just save the human fucking race.'
She was pissed that she wrecked her favorite car. Cars are hard enough to piece together, but a loss of this diamon particularly pissed her off. She pulled the radio off the dash and tried it. Not even a crackle. She hopped they were watching. All she could do now is sit and wait.
The man in the Tempest found the 85 highway and cruzed thinking about what he was just party to. He never asked questions before, but if he was going to be taking this boys all the way to Boston, he will need some answers. He reached over and checked the boy's pulse and found it about as fast as he was going, but slowing. He saw the boy's chest slowing his breathing from the crankshaft type breaths he was expelling earlier. 790Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡW7mqBD85uj
'We just gotta make over the river, then we're safe til Niagara. He was headed to one of the only left to cross the Detroit River, the Ambassador Bridge. His eyes caught a glint in his rearview mirror through the broken glass of the rear windshield. What looked to be three older mustangs were closing fast. There would be no fighting these ponies. He stepped on the gas and didn't let off until he saw the Ambassador Bridge come into view in front of them.
"He's headed toward the bridge. There's no way he'll make the jump though since we put up the net on the other side."
A section of the bridge was destroyed in the Great War to keep the Canadian Corporation Alliance from entering Detroit through simple means. The net was a specific net used on the USS Crescent City, an aircraft carrier that was made into a museum ship down in New Orleans to stop runaway aircraft during an emergency landing. There would be no breaking through. The same report squawked through the radio located on the underneath of the Tempest's dash that Fenyx had stolen from a Hunter last year. 'Well, at least they are too stupid to change frequencies.' He thought.790Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwqIEqVICBJ
Gunfire erupted around him causing him to turn off the 85 sooner than he wanted. He busted through a double chain link fence into the Customs compound for the American side of the bridge. He heard the report, but he was going to attempt the jump regardless. He just hoped Rico had come through for him again. He hadn't let me down before, hopefully he didn't start now.
An RPG whizzed by his passenger side mirror and exploded a building on the compound in front of the Tempest. "These guys are serious cheesedicks," he protested while dodging careening debris. The Tempest sped through multiple right hand turns, bouncing off bullets left and right. The Mustangs were closing and not shy about spending bullets More shots rang out as he blew through the old Customs checkpoints taking the mirrors and implanting one round into the roof just beside his right ear. He leaned into the inclined turn like a windsurfer into the wave.
The Tempest leveled out onto the bridge just as the boy started to wake up from his slumber. With a yawn, "Are we there yet?" Fenyx stayed focused on what he saw before him.
There was a crude ramp setup on the American side of the bridge for the Hunters to cross into Canada over the gaping 30 foot hole in the center section of the suspension bridge. He saw the three mustangs below, they didn't' follow him, but one of them was holding the RPG from before with a missile pointed at the net on the Canadian side of the bridge. As he got closer he saw the headlights of 10 cars waiting for him on the Canadian side just past the net. 'Just in case the gap in the bridge, the unbreakable net, and the RPG don't stop me, no doubt.' He thought.
He pushed the gas peddle as fast as it would go toward the ramp, pinning the tachometer near its breaking point into the red. He smiled as he closed in on the ramp. The boy looked on with worry. The excitement had faded after his episode. The tempest was almost there. Just a few more feet to the jump.
The tall man in the red valet jacket locked onto the Tempest traversing the bridge above them with the sights of the RPG. As the Tempest came to the jump, he let the missile fly toward the net in anticipation of the Tempest's trajectory.
The Tempest approached the end of the bridge and flew as the missile exploded the net, taking parts of the bridge and raining them down into the river 150 feet below. The tempest had veered off course and to the right of the ramp at the last second flying straight off the bridge and headed directly for the water below. The boy looked on in horror as the nose of the Tempest turned slightly upward due to the weight of the back end.
A million thoughts flashed into the boy's head as he awaited the end of his short life. 'I would have liked to have kissed a girl. That girl that was trying to kill us was cute. I coulda kissed her. I really wanted to drive this car, or any car for that matter. I wonder what my Mom is like. And, where is this rooster he was going on about?'
The man was praying a silent prayer, the first time in his life that had happened, but he had seen one unexplained miracle tonight, 'How 'bout one more?'
When the wheels touched down on the barges set up by his friend, however, he didn't think God, "Thank you RIco!" The barges dipped wildly in a spray of water from the river and sparks from the car. Fenyx lost control as the Tempest fishtailed from side to side then drifting on the iced over steel surface of the old barges toward the edge. Fenyx feathered the gas and at the last second regain control and brought the beast to a halt with one tire peeking over the side to the water below. The two passengers of the wild ride sat for a minute in a moment of quiet contemplation. Hearts beating out of chests were heard in each others ears. They were in shock and disbelief that they were still alive.
The shouting heard from above them ignited the man's awareness again as he restarted the car. "You OK kid?"
Silence. The boy's hands were still braced on the dash and side door for impact, his eyes were absolutely wild and looking a thousand yards ahead out the window at his past and future at the same time.
"Kid?"
Kid? You OK?"
"Can. We. Do THAT AGAIN?!"
Fenyx shook his head with a grin and an eye roll and stormed off the barge heading toward the heart of Windsor on the way to Niagara. It would be morning soon, and a whole different breed of monster would be stalking them. He had to make haste. The fate of the world, the human race depended on it.
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